No FF on 360

[cthellis42]

Well duh.

Of course there's a bit of "forward-looking" to it, because one question even by current standards was "is he talking about current development?" If there's no development going on right now, then chances are they couldn't turn on a dime regardless, and there'd still be no possibility of an FF showing up for a couple years regardless.

No one in their right minds was saying "they said they'd never, ever, ever, EVER make one!"

 

[scooby_dooby]

Well duh.

Of course there's a bit of "forward-looking" to it, because one question even by current standards was "is he talking about current development?" If there's no development going on right now, then chances are they couldn't turn on a dime regardless, and there'd still be no possibility of an FF showing up for a couple years regardless.

No one in their right minds was saying "they said they'd never, ever, ever, EVER make one!"

You do wonder why they felt the need to clarify though...

 

[rabidrabbit]

You do wonder why they felt the need to clarify though...

Because they were asked (to)? Because teh internet has gone wild again with rumours that might hurt the company and it's relationships with the console manufacturers, thus some vague PR statement to keep the investors calm.

The xbox360 already got a Final Fantasy from the main series, FFXI.
It didn't sell even though it had little competition on the platform at that time, why would SE think FFXIII would sell on the same platform now when there is more competition.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Because teh internet has gone wild again with rumours that might hurt the company and it's relationships with the console manufacturers, thus some vague PR statement to keep the investors calm.

Which is what Scooby was saying.

cthellis42 - No one in their right minds was saying "they said they'd never, ever, ever, EVER make one!"

If no-one was saying that, there'd be no rumours to hurt relations! The PR statement is to explain to all those people not in their right minds the mind-numbingly obvious - At the moment the list of FF titles heading for XB360 are none, with the piece of paper listing those titles being blank. At the moment. Anything can happen (in the next half hour).

 

[PARANOiA]

Because they were asked (to)? Because teh internet has gone wild again with rumours that might hurt the company and it's relationships with the console manufacturers, thus some vague PR statement to keep the investors calm.

The xbox360 already got a Final Fantasy from the main series, FFXI.
It didn't sell even though it had little competition on the platform at that time, why would SE think FFXIII would sell on the same platform now when there is more competition.

The reason it didn't sell had nothing to do with Xbox gamers not wanting an FF game. It didn't sell because it was a bad port of a several year-old PS2 game with minor graphical updates and required a paid subscription, when most gamers already paid up for Live.

No one is dumb enough to believe FFXIII on 360 would sell as poorly as FFXI did. At least I hope not.

 

[rabidrabbit]

The reason it didn't sell had nothing to do with Xbox gamers not wanting an FF game. It didn't sell because it was a bad port of a several year-old PS2 game with minor graphical updates and required a paid subscription, when most gamers already paid up for Live.

No one is dumb enough to believe FFXIII on 360 would sell as poorly as FFXI did. At least I hope not.

Yet, they were dumb enough to think a bad port of several year old PS2 game with minor graphical updates and requiring a paid subscription, when most gamers already paid up for Live, would still sell enough to warrant the port in the first place.
If a port of FFXII was to be made for xbox360, some sacrifices would have to be made, mainly due to the limitations on storage space and the engine being natively optimised for PS3. It is possible a port would not even be possible, as I think the developers themselves have said so.
Would an inferior port sell enough to make porting it worthwile.

 

[cthellis42]

You do wonder why they felt the need to clarify though...

True enough, but the clarification is basically as ambiguous as the initial statement. I assume they just don't want to be seen as "agreement by silence" for the zanier comments running out there, nor step on anyone's toes. Not that I think that's the right move to take.

cthellis42 - No one in their right minds was saying "they said they'd never, ever, ever, EVER make one!"

If no-one was saying that, there'd be no rumours to hurt relations! The PR statement is to explain to all those people not in their right minds the mind-numbingly obvious - At the moment the list of FF titles heading for XB360 are none, with the piece of paper listing those titles being blank. At the moment. Anything can happen (in the next half hour).

Yes, well I did say "in their right minds" for a reason.

I do wish companies would adopt more of a "ignore dumb-ass comments" approach for the knee-jerk rumor mongering, rather than be seen like their backpedaling, or trying to soothe someone's ego, or grease a palm, or what have you. It will not stop the initial rumor mongering anyway, and it will simply kick-start a whole swath of NEW ones.

Unless you're going to GIVE A GODDAM PRECISE DETAIL of some sort, why bother? They "clarified" nothing at all, and could just as soon have said "ignore idiocy" in slightly more polite language.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Unless you're going to GIVE A GODDAM PRECISE DETAIL of some sort, why bother? They "clarified" nothing at all, and could just as soon have said "ignore idiocy" in slightly more polite language.

On the one hand it'd be nice if companies didn't pussy foot around nonsense comments, but at the same time I guess they'd rather appear apologetic than arrogant. Taking the Church and R:FoM nonsense, Sony could readily have responded fairly with a comment 'sue us for what exactly?' but by going with the PR friendly 'we take everything very seriously' they're not going to look like the heartless, arrogant multinational disrespecting people.

PR is just an ugly side of our society.

 

[cthellis42]

Right. I'm just saying they could take an approach of either non-resopose (which means it's still only the idiots and rumor-frenzying types making a ruckus for a week or so, then disappearing, with the only remnant being idiotic fanboys on message boards rather than blog front pages), or--if they must--a quick "responding to clearly foolish analysis does no one any good."

It's also quite a different case, IMHO, when responding to a Church organization levelling concerns about THEIR representation than it is to respond to blog sites trying to attract eyes by publishing/rehashing wanton speculation in order to score a few more hits.


Meanwhile, there's nothing they could EVER do to quell the din in the message board community, or what passes through sites like Fark and Digg.

 

[Nesh]

Im going to add some more fuel to the fire.




Source"

Bah you arent adding any fuel. Its just a rephrase of what the other guy said: "As for Final Fantasy on the Xbox 360, it's currently a completely blank page."

He is only repeating what the other guy said

 

[Xalion]

Unless you're going to GIVE A GODDAM PRECISE DETAIL of some sort, why bother? They "clarified" nothing at all, and could just as soon have said "ignore idiocy" in slightly more polite language.

I think one of the main problems with this type of clarification is that it doesn't exist. The initial statement was pretty clear - there is no current developement for FF on the XBox 360. That is a clear, very precise statement. It gives all of the information you need to know about FF on the XBox 360 currently.

The problem is that is not what people want to know. They want to know "will there ever be plans for FF on the XBox 360". That question is impossible to answer. We all know how often games in development get canceled. If concrete plans like that can change, then how solid do you think statements about futures with no plans are? They can't come out and say "We will never make a FF game for the XBox 360" because the market dictates their strategy and they can't predict the market. They can't come out and say "We will make a FF game for the XBox 360" because the market dictates their strategy and they can't predict the market. They can only state what the current case is - and they did quite clearly.

Regardless of how clear their response or what they say, someone will try to twist it into what they want it to mean. This time it was the "Well, they may not be working on it now but that doesn't mean they wont in the future!" argument vs the "They said no FF forever!" argument. It is two sides who want their own specific agenda "reading between the lines" to see their own meaning.

I think the statement by Square Enix was very clear on what their current plans are. It tells me I should not expect any FF game for the XBox 360 for at least 2 years. Beyond that? Well, if I could tell you that I'd be rich from predicting the stock market by now.

 

[DeadlyNinja]

How about we talk about FF after the Xbox can sell in countries other than USA, and England?

People were running around claiming Blue Dragon would be the savior of the 360 in Japan because it was made by some of the biggest names in RPG, and all it did was caused a small jump in sales for a single week, then drop right off the charts. That small jump didn't even give it enough to claim the top spot in console sales that week in Japan. If you look at Tales of Symphonia for the GC, the week the game was released caused to GC to jump over the PS2 sales for that week. I'm willing to bet that Blue Dragon sure as hell didn't pull enough sales to even earn back a quarter of the money spent on development. Yes, we should wait for BD sales and see how the game does in other territories compared to Japan, but I doubt it'll pull the kind of sales most RPGs can pull in Japan.

Let us wait and see how Trusty Bell and FF13 before we get ahead of ourselves. I honestly can't see Trusty Bell pulling more sales than BD, but I wouldn't mind being wrong about that. We should also wait for FF13 to see if it can truly the fortunes of a lagging system in Japan before we can gauge whether the risk is worth it for the 360 as well.

Of course I'm mainly talking about the "main" part of the FF franchise -- for all we know, Square could throw out a Final Fantasy First Person Shooter with the Unreal 3 engine a couple of years down the line for the 360 thus giving it an FF of their own.

 

[cthellis42]

I think one of the main problems with this type of clarification is that it doesn't exist. The initial statement was pretty clear - there is no current developement for FF on the XBox 360. That is a clear, very precise statement. It gives all of the information you need to know about FF on the XBox 360 currently.

Precisely. What did the clarification say that the original one didn't?

In matters like this, I'd like to see companies not get driven around the nose by idiocy and wild speculation, and either ignore it or call it what it is.

 

[TheChefO]

I think the most telling thing about this second statement is it's existance at all. The fact they had to restate and clarify that the original statement did not mean xbox360 would never see FF is telling.

In fact, it tells me that a FF on xb360 is likely. Otherwise, they would have left the statement as it was.

Not sure what the behind the scenes politics or money exhanges may be taking place, but it's clear Squenix does not want to be tied directly and exclusively to ps3 this gen.

 

[Xenus]

It tells no such thing. It's just an ass covering PR move in case they do create one.

 

[rabidrabbit]

People were running around claiming Blue Dragon would be the savior of the 360 in Japan because it was made by some of the biggest names in RPG, and all it did was caused a small jump in sales for a single week, then drop right off the charts. That small jump didn't even give it enough to claim the top spot in console sales that week in Japan. If you look at Tales of Symphonia for the GC, the week the game was released caused to GC to jump over the PS2 sales for that week. I'm willing to bet that Blue Dragon sure as hell didn't pull enough sales to even earn back a quarter of the money spent on development. Yes, we should wait for BD sales and see how the game does in other territories compared to Japan, but I doubt it'll pull the kind of sales most RPGs can pull in Japan.

Off topic, but they really should have released Blue Dragon first in west, or at least simultaneously in Japan and US.
Now it's lost a lot of steam and good publicity, because not succeeding in Japan as many expected.
It being a japanese rpg, and not being a big hit in Japan might give the wrong impression in the west that it's not a good game, while in reality it's "failure" was mainly due to low installed base.

Maybe Square Enix have looked at Blue Dragon sales and concluded that investing a lot of resources and money into developing such a massive game to xb360 just doesn't make sense financially.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I think the most telling thing about this second statement is it's existance at all. The fact they had to restate and clarify that the original statement did not mean xbox360 would never see FF is telling.

In fact, it tells me that a FF on xb360 is likely. Otherwise, they would have left the statement as it was.

No, it's just covering 5 years. SE themselves don't know if in the next 5 years they'll produce an XB360 FF games or not. Some people were taking some comments to mean they never would, which is inaccurate. So the clarification goes out 'we might do.' But that means exactly that. It's not ruled at, as per daft misinterpretations of a prior statement, but it doesn't say they plan to either. Only it's a possibility.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Why the hell would they need to cover themselves for the next 5 year? Gaming journalism sucks these days, if thats really an issue.

 

[one]

Without further complication, the simplest way to put it is there will be no single-player FF game for 360 in 2008 if they are not making any in 2007. It's not that they are doing nothing, they have Last Remnant and FF MMORPG and they are what SE thinks the best way to make money out of the investment.

 

[archangelmorph]

Without further complication, the simplest way to put it is there will be no single-player FF game for 360 in 2008 if they are not making any in 2007. It's not that they are doing nothing, they have Last Remnant and FF MMORPG and they are what SE thinks the best way to make money out of the investment.

#using namespace single_player_game

void Xbox360(void)
{

    if( !InDevelopment( kFinalFantasy, 2007 ) )
    {
         SetReleaseDate( kFinalFantasy, 2008, false );
         SetReleaseDate( kFinalFantasy, 2009, false );
         SetReleaseDateUS( kFinalFantasy, 2010, false );
         SetReleaseDateUK( kFinalFantasy, 2242, false );
    }
}